Ricciardo seeks cause of his problem: 'Don't want to start from scratch'

Daniel Ricciardo has taken a moment to unwind after the Azerbaijan Grand Prix. The Australian would have preferred his start at McLaren to have gone slightly differently, but is working hard on himself to get better at his new team.

McLaren simulator offers solution

Ricciardo was brought in by McLaren as the replacement for Carlos Sainz. The Australian was on McLaren's wish list ahead of the 2019 season, but the Australian chose Renault. This time, McLaren was the right option for him. In 2021 however, it hasn't gone as expected. Lando Norris has been by far the best of the two, so Ricciardo will have to work hard to close the gap to his teammate.

After his lacklustre performance in Azerbaijan, Ricciardo took some time for himself and then climbed into McLaren's simulator. ''I tried to find out exactly what is going on, how the car works and what can make it work properly. I didn't want to start from scratch again, but it was more trying things out with a clean slate,'' Ricciardo said to Formel1.de.

The Ricciardo train

''We wanted to find out why certain things don't work. You could say we played a lot. Now a lot of things have become clear to me. So that was very useful. Now I'm mainly looking forward to putting it all into practice'', revealed the multiple race winner, who is certainly not starting to doubt himself yet.

''Deep inside I know what I can do. Of course I would have preferred not to be in the current situation or to solve this earlier, but it is a marathon and not a sprint. I also know that once it 'clicks', everything will be fine again. Then everyone jumps back on the Ricciardo train'', the McLaren driver concluded.